Phytochemicals as Complementary and Alternative Therapeutic Formulations with Potential pro-Apoptotic Effects on Various Cancerous Cell Lines: A Literature Survey

Cancer is characterized as one of the deadliest diseases and claims millions of lives every year with higher proportion of causalities in developing countries as compared to the developed ones. Though there exist a number of treatment technologies against cancer including chemotherapies, radiotherapies, surgeries etc. But people are now turning towards plant derived herbal therapies for treatment of cancerous diseases due to ill-effects associated with allopathic treatments. These plant derived bioactive compounds may target fast dividing cells by impairing mitosis or cause target cells to undergo apoptosis without affecting normal cells. This manuscript is concerned about current scenario of epidemiological prevalence of various cancer lines, the pharmacological applications of various plant derived bioactive compounds with potential competency as anticancer therapeutic agents and delineation of probable effects of these compounds on cellular targets and their mechanisms of action.